


In This Abyss

by ac_MaryAgnes



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: AU at the CDC, Carl Grimes is a perfect cinnamon roll, Dale needs to butt the hell out, F/M, Hopefully Lori isn't making things worse, Shane being Shane, after the rec room scene, poor rick, she's just trying her best guys, too good for this world, too pure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-26
Updated: 2018-06-26
Packaged: 2019-05-28 18:52:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15055526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ac_MaryAgnes/pseuds/ac_MaryAgnes
Summary: "Don't leave me here, without you."Perhaps not forgiveness - no, she wasn't ready for that yet. But understanding.





	In This Abyss

**Author's Note:**

> "Be with me always--take any form--drive me mad. Only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!" - Emily Bronte (Heathcliff: 'Wuthering Heights')
> 
> Urgh, and the saga continues. Seriously, these two are giving me all the Heights and Wuthers. 
> 
> (and as before, this is un-beta'd)

Lori sat on the rec room floor, knees drawn up to her chest, shirt pulled over them. Her wine glass was still half-full, forgotten on a table. Her mind wasn’t nearly as fuzzy as she’d wanted it to be. No, instead of having the pleasant buzz she had looked forward to, everything was startlingly clear. Clear and ugly.

Except it wasn’t. Ugly, yes, but nothing made sense. The world had fallen apart. Her husband who had died was miraculously alive. And the man who had saved her and her son, who she’d given her body to – and had started to give her heart to – had attacked her. Yeah, he was drunk and frantic, but the way he’d touched her, the way he didn’t stop until she hurt him back… That wasn’t the Shane she knew.

Shane always had a joke and a smile for her. Shane came to their house for barbeques and cookouts, spouting crazy stories of his latest conquest. Shane volunteered as a shooting instructor at the gun range for local kids after school during his off time. Shane held bags for her when she was coming home from the grocery store and Rick was in the hospital. He taught Carl how to tie knots, catch frogs, and handle a knife. Shane put his life on the line again and again for her and her son since the dead rose.

Whoever that had been, that man who shoved his hands into her shorts and… _that man_ hadn’t been Shane.

Lori picked herself up off the ground and grabbed the shelves as a sudden light-headedness his her. Maybe she _was_ still a little tipsy. But she had to follow him. Hadn’t that been the way things were now? Shane went, and Lori followed.

She had to stop herself from pounding on his door. She didn’t want everyone to know she was here, didn’t want to start that rumour mill again. Not yet. Lori knocked carefully and waited, but when he didn’t answer she tried the doorknob. The door wasn’t locked and there was no resistance when she pushed it open.

Shane was lying on his stomach on the bed, face buried in a pillow, and she wondered for a moment if he was trying to suffocate himself. She pushed the door shut firmly behind her, and the slight bang brought him scrambling up off the mattress. He stumbled into the side table, almost upsetting the lamp before he was able to turn around. Shocked brown eyes swam in his face, red and ashamed.

“Lori,” he breathed, voice thick and low. He took an unsteady step in her direction, but she swooped towards him, cutting him off. The sight of him like this, sloppy and out of control, made her angry. How could he let himself get this way, so desperate and careless? It disgusted her, and she let that rage carry her forward.

“I’m _not_ forgiving you,” Lori bit out, teeth grit, finger pushing into the hard lines of Shane’s chest. “You’re gonna have to **_crawl_** before I do that.”

“Anything, Lo-“

“Shut up. You’re drunk – that’s the only reason I’m here right now instead of curled up safe in bed with my husband.” She couldn’t help the dig – he deserved it. “What you said,” she started again after a moment, “about not hearing his heart beat at the hospital, about doing what you knew he’d want you to…. Rick’s a good man and a good father. It’s a miracle he’s survived like he did, and that he found us again. He’s a sweet, kind man, Shane, but… but I can't keep doing this any more. He and I had drifted apart, before all this. And a zombie apocalypse doesn’t mean he’s suddenly any better at paying attention to me or what I need. And after he came back, when we were… together-“

“Aw, Lor,” Shane groaned, agony etched in his blunt features, “Lori, please don’t.”

“ _When he and I were together_ ,” she pressed on, “all I could think about was that he wasn’t you. And I have been trying this whole time to convince myself that I didn’t miss you and the way you held me and loved me. But I do. Even… even with what you just did. So-so we’re going to figure this out, Shane Walsh. And in the mean time, _you_  are going to _crawl_.”

Hope and pain warred across Shane’s face, a tragedy playing out in the depths of his eyes. Bringing her hands up but carefully not touching him, she guided him backwards onto the bed. He laid down and looked up at her, but she didn’t join him. Instead, she nabbed a pillow and the comforter off the bed.

“You’re gonna sleep that drunk off and we’re going to talk more about this in the morning,” she told him. Her voice buzzed in her nose like she’d been crying for a while.

Lori set up a little sleeping area on the floor near the door to his room, curled herself into the blanket, and set herself to the task of falling asleep.

In the morning, she woke up to find they’d traded places: she was on the bed and he’d taken up her nest on the ground. Shane was already awake, staring into space with his back against the wall, arms propped up on his knees. His eyes were guarded when they moved to meet hers as she sat up.

“What do you remember from last night?” she asked, pushing her hair out of her face. No ‘good morning’; no pleasantries. She wasn’t in the mood to diddle around.

“I remember finding you in the rec room.” His voice was rough in the morning twilight. “I remember… puttin’ my hands on you. In a way I ain’t ever gonna forgive myself for. But I thought you comin’ to see me after was a dream.”

“I wasn’t going to,” she admitted softly. “I was going to go to bed, try to pretend nothing had ever happened. But that’s what I’ve been doing, since Rick came back, and it hasn’t been working out so well.” He was silent, just watching her. After a minute she got impatient. “You gonna say anything or just keep staring at me?”

Shane took a deep breath. “You have to know I never wanted to hurt you, Lori.”

“We’re not gonna talk about that yet,” she stopped him, shaking her head. “I’m not ready to forgive you, and I don’t know when I will be. Not for that, anyway. But we have things to talk about, about what went on between us and how we’re gonna move forward.”

“I wanna be with you,” he was quick to say. “In any way you let me, I just want you with me. Now I know you think I lied to you, but I did what I thought was best at the time. And I can’t make myself regret it because it means you and Carl are here, alive. But cutting me out like you did, and then telling me to stay away from you and him when you know how I feel? It wasn’t fair, Lori. I did nothing but love and protect you two, and cuttin’ me out like that – without even hearing what I had to say – wasn’t right.”

Lori nodded carefully. She’d acted in anger then, rash and full of vinegar. She’d been so surprised at Rick’s reappearance, so unreasonably upset, she’d had to do something – scream, anything. And the most convenient target had been Shane. The interloper. “I miss… I miss how we were. The way we were after Atlanta was bombed. I want that back, Shane. I wasn’t lying last night – being with Rick is wonderful, but he wasn’t here and you were. And I want to believe you did everything you could to save him at the hospital-“

“Lori, you know – you _have_ to know – I’d never’a left him, wouldn’t even consider it, if I had any idea his heart was still beating.” Shane’s face was so earnest, so sincere. He was begging her to understand and believe him.

Lori nodded slowly. She really wasn’t sure she was doing the right thing, but everything had felt right with Shane, before Rick had found their camp. “We’re gonna have to go at my speed, Shane. If we’re going to be together, actually and really together, we have to respect Rick and Carl and you have to be okay with what I’m willing to give you.”

Shane took a shuttering breath and nodded. “I swear. Just don’t shut me out anymore. Don’t leave me here, without you.” He clenched his jaw, keeping himself from getting up off the floor and going to her, taking her into his arms, pressing her into the mattress and convincing himself she’d never leave. “Just be with me.”

She took a long, slow breath and nodded. “Alright.”

* * *

Later, when she spoke to Rick away from everyone else, she cried. She hadn’t meant to, but the look on his face was so broken, so betrayed. Lori thought for a moment that maybe she was doing the wrong thing, again. That maybe she shouldn’t be telling Rick what happened when she and Shane thought he was dead, and that she definitely shouldn’t be ending things with Rich now that he was back. It would be easier – on him, on Carl – to ignore what she and Shane had found. But she was dying inside, and she couldn’t keep pushing Shane to the edge like she had been. Lying to him like she’d been had been easy, but it wasn’t right.

“Rick, _please_ ,” she pleaded. “Don’t be mad at Shane. He was doing his best and we… we connected. I’ve been trying to ignore it, but that’s not fair and I can’t keep doing it anymore.”

Rick scrubbed his hands over his hair, gripping his curls tightly before letting them go. “Was this… was _this_ going on before…”

“No.” Lori was adamant about that. “Whatever problems you and I had before virus broke out, Rick, Shane had nothing to do with them.”

Rick kept his eyes on the ground and nodded, distracted and overwhelmed with what she’d told him. “I, uh… oh god. I need to be alone for a while.”

Lori took a fortifying breath and swallowed around the clog in her throat. She hated breaking this good man’s heart. She brushed the dampness from her cheeks with the sleeves of her shirt and started backing away. “Okay.”

“Will you talk to Carl about this?” he asked before she got too far away.

She paused. “Oh… I hadn’t figured that out yet. I’ll try to talk to him about this within the next day or two. Did you want to talk to him?”

Rick clenched his jaw a few times and shook his head. He still wouldn’t look at her. “Not yet. Um… I-I gotta think about this… for a while.”

Lori nodded carefully. “Alright.”

At dinner, Shane and Rick arrived at the same time. Each wore bruises and scrapes on their faces, their fists, but Lori knew they weren’t from any encounter with a Walker. Rick still looked tense and angry, but Shane seemed more settled. He sat across from her and she could feel his shoe slide against hers under the table. It was forward of him, and it annoyed her a little, but that’s how he’d always been. Forward, testing the boundaries, pushing the envelope. Kissing her when someone might find them. Brushing up against her when he didn’t have to. Standing just a little too close when they were going over plans. That was just Shane, and it was almost nice that he was closer to his old self again.

* * *

Lori and Carl had their talk just before bed. She sat him down on a couch in one of the break rooms (not the rec room, couldn’t go back in there yet), and perched in front of him on a coffee table.

“You know I love you Carl, don’t you? And I’d never do anything to hurt you?” Lori asked.

Her son looked up at her with a frown. “Yeah mom. I know that.”

Lori nodded to herself and wished she’d had last night’s glass of wine still. “Good. That’s good. And you know your dad and Shane… they’d never do anything to hurt you, either?”

“Mom, is everything okay? Did you… did you get bit?” Carl’s eyes, so clear and so much like his father’s, grew frantic.

“Oh no, sweetie.” Lori held her boy’s arms and looked him straight. “Carl, no. No one’s been bitten. This is… this is something else, sweetheart.”

Carl screwed his lips to the side. “Is this about you and Shane?”

Lori’s eyes popped open. “What? How did-“

Carl shrugged and looked at the ground. “Mom, everybody knows. ‘Cept for dad.”

She swallowed and scrambled to reorganise her thoughts. “Uh, well… Your dad knows now. I told him this afternoon. I know… I know there’s been a lot going on recently. First we thought your dad was… was gone. Then, well, zombies and all of that ugliness. And then your dad was back.”

“And we got to be a family again for a little while.”

“No,” Lori cooed, dismayed as she brushed Carl’s hair back with her fingers. “Not just a little while. Carl, we’re still a family. We always _will_ be. We’re just… not configured the same way anymore. I’m still your mom; your dad is still your dad. But your dad and I… we just won’t be together any more. We still love you – so, _so_ much, baby. That’s not ever going to change.”

The boy studied her face for a long moment. “What about Shane? Is he part of our family now, too?”

“Shane’s always been part of our family, hasn’t he?” She hoped he thought so. “Kind of like an uncle? Now… well, now he’s gonna be like an uncle that’s with your mom.”

Carl considered this. “Kayla Reyes in my class, her parents were divorced. Her dad married this other lady, and Kayla said she had two moms. Am I gonna have two dads now?”

Lori frowned. “I’m not sure, sweetheart. Shane and I, we’re not ready for that yet. Shane… Shane and I got into an argument – a really bad one – and he still needs to apologise before we’re anywhere close to that sort of thing. But you know Shane loves you, and he’ll do everything in his power to protect you. And if he tells you to do something that doesn’t go against what your dad and I have told you, you’re to do it. Just like before.”

One of Carl’s hands came up and toyed with her hair. He’d done it since he was a baby, but it had become so rare now that he was older. “Shane was kinda great,” he said hesitantly, “when everything happened. He made things fun. Are… are you going to sleep in Shane’s room now? Instead of with me and dad?”

Lori closed her eyes and prayed for… something. Rick had handled the ‘birds and the bees’ talk with Carl when he’d turned 10 and she was not prepared that sort of question. “Not any time soon, sweetheart. I might see if Sophia and Carol have space in their room for one more, or maybe I’ll find somewhere else. But no, Shane and I probably won’t be sharing a room for a while.”

Carl shrugged. “It’d be okay,” he said. “I think he misses us, mom. We used to share a tent all the time, but now he’s by himself. I know you said you guys argued, but maybe you could make an exception? So he’s not so angry and sad all the time any more?”

And her boy’s face was so sweet, so open and honest that if he’d asked Lori for anything right then and there, she’d give it to him.

“Never get hard, baby,” she whispered. “There is so much goodness in you. Don’t let what’s happened in this world take it away.”

After sending Carl off to bed, Lori was at a loss. She dithered around the break room for a little while longer, poking her head into cabinets, flipping through scientific magazines, trying to kill time until she felt tired. Dale wandered in after an hour.

“Oh! Lori,” he startled. “I was just poking around. Find anything good?”

She offered a wan smile. “No. Coffee and some… light reading, I guess,” she said, gesturing to the magazines.

“Ah. That’s a shame. Uh, while I have you alone, I just wanted to tell you that… well, I’m glad you found your husband. Rick is… he’s a good man. And, it might not be my place to say, but I’m very glad you and Shane aren’t-“

“ _Dale_ ,” she cut him off. Every word he said was staring to make her blood boil. “It really isn’t any of your business. I do not need your opinion on my personal life. And really, you have no room to talk: we’ve all seen the way you look at Andrea.”

She let that rage carry her right out the room, down the hallway and… somehow end up at Shane’s door. Again.

Shaking her head at herself, Lori raised her hand to knock when it swung open. Shane stood at the other end, watching her carefully.

“Heard you mutterin’ down the hall,” he said. “What’s got your blood up this time?”

She rolled her eyes. “Dale, sticking his _sharp_ little nose into everything.”

Shane hummed and leaned against the door, giving her enough room if she wanted to come in. Lori hesitated for a moment before moving inside and letting him close the door behind her. The click of the latch was defining in the small room and her breath caught at the sound. She turned around and eyed him.

“I’m still angry at you,” she told him, almost defending her being there. “But… Carl said something, that you maybe missed us and –“

“I do.”

“And maybe sleeping in here with you would help you not be so angry or sad anymore.”

“It will,” he said, hiding a smile, brown eyes bright with humour and joy.

“We are _not_ having sex,” she dictated, branching a finger out to stop Shane from getting too cocky. “We will be _sleeping only_ , Shane. On _separate_ sides of the bed.”

“Well, we can try but I seem to remember you being like, a heat-seeking missile or something,” he teased, “and climbing all over me in the middle of the night.”

Lori rolled her eyes. “Go brush your teeth.”

Shane’s smirk turned into a full-blown grin. “Yes ma’am.”

She pretended she didn’t want his arms around her as they climbed into opposite sides of the bed. Facing him, watching the shadows in the dark play across the planes and valleys of his face, Lori pretended she was okay being so far away from him. Because she was still so angry, and she didn’t want to be the kind of woman who just rolled over for a man who attacked her, she braced a pillow to her front so she’d hug that instead of him. So there’d be some sort of barrier between them. So maybe there would be a possibility of them taking this… reunion of sorts slow.

Across from her, Shane slid his hand over the sheets, reaching towards her.

“I know you don’t wanna touch me,” he whispered, his voice dark and quiet in the night. “Know I haven’t earned that back yet. But can I… Can I please just know you’re here?”

Lori licked her lips and shuffled around, getting comfortable under the covers, snuggling the pillow. Carefully, feeling a bit like a skittish doe, she reached out and slid her palm against his. His skin jumped under her fingers, but his grip was warm and solid. And he held her hand all night.

**Author's Note:**

> After reading this, I would like you to know that I do not condone - in any fashion - what Shane did to Lori in the rec room. Having been a victim of sexual violence, I am very well aware of the after affects on one's psyche and mental well being, and that pursuing one's abuser is not under any circumstances wise. This is fiction, though, where characters act out what we'd never dream of. Lori, here, has the insight to know that something is wrong with Shane. She also knows that trying to put back together what she had with Rick is a bad idea - it was broken and pretending otherwise would make everything that much worse (much like it did in the show). 
> 
> Cathy breaks up with Linton, and Heathcliff isn't drawn to Isabel's pathetic arms. They are still terrible, but not quite as terrible as they would be otherwise. And hopefully, thusly they are able to skirt ruination.


End file.
